


The Nature of the Beast

by alexjanna91



Series: Footprints on Earth (Antichrist!Winchesters) [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Hurt Sam Winchester, M/M, Protective Dean Winchester, Wincest - Freeform, antichrist!boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-31
Updated: 2012-01-31
Packaged: 2017-10-30 09:58:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/330493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexjanna91/pseuds/alexjanna91
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Winchesters land in Bobby’s yard wounded and hunted, he finds his house suddenly under siege and himself being threatened by his own community. Life with the Winchesters around is never dull.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Nature of the Beast

**Author's Note:**

> Third in my Footprints on Earth arc in my on-going Antichrist!Winchesters verse. Some elements of this story have been borrowed from episodes Hunted(2:10), Bloodlust(2:3), and Dead Man’s Blood(1:20).

Bobby’s eyes snapped open to complete darkness. The house was too quiet. Not a single creak or groan from the old place could be heard. Not the crickets from outside or the wind in the trees. 

The hair on the back of his neck stood on end as Bobby eased himself out of bed to slip into a pair of pants and boots. He crept to the door of his room, his old revolver heavy in his hand though he didn’t remember picking it up. Making his way through the house, Bobby retrieved the old pump action shotgun he kept at the bottom of the stairs, the Bowie knife he stashed in one of his book shelves, a flask of holy water, and his cap. 

None of his thresholds had been breached; the salt lines were pure and unbroken. The Devil’s Traps scattered through the house were empty, dormant. Everything was as it should be and still the fine hairs over his body were tingling in anticipation. 

Through the windows of his study he caught a flash of movement out in the yard. In the towers of scrap metal and junked cars, something was out there. 

The moon was bright and full, but the yard cast long shadows and the slightest inkling of movement had Bobby tensing with every step he took. Everything was too bloody quiet. Shotgun held at the ready he moved through the yard on silent hunter’s feet. 

Halfway to the end of the yard the air behind him ghosted across the skin of his neck. Jerking around, gun steady and aimed, Bobby saw nothing but the empty path behind him. A creak at the top of a tower to his right had him jerking in the opposite direction and still he saw nothing. 

It was toying with him. Stalking him on his own turf. 

A low inaudible growl of anger rumbled through his chest as Bobby started back toward the house. It was easier to defend. The house was a fortress, whatever this thing was it was going to have to come to him. 

One step, two, three steps toward the shelter of his house Bobby felt it. His entire body gave a shiver as the eyes on him didn’t waver, didn’t blink, just stared. 

It was watching him. 

Bobby stood frozen for a breath before he snapped around shotgun aimed unerringly up at the top of the scrap tower just behind him and to his left. That was when he saw him. 

Perched on the top of the tower still as a predator ready to pounce with green eyes glowing like reflectors in the darkness was Dean Winchester. But there was something wrong, something different about him and Bobby stood completely and utterly still while he took the scene in. 

Dean did not look like the petulant, grinning, sarcastic young man that he always did. He looked… savage. While his eyes shone like a cat’s in the moonlit darkness, his skin almost glowed with power and danger. His body was tensed and ready and crouched as if about to lunge. 

In the darkness and his sudden panic, Bobby felt his knees go weak. Had the Winchesters finally decided that he’d worn out his usefulness? Were they here to send him to his maker? 

It was then that Bobby noticed something else. Sam Winchester was not crouched next to his brother where he should be. He was laid out protectively beneath Dean on top of the scrap, his body motionless and his skin pale and bloodied. 

A sudden hiss and snarl from Dean told Bobby that the boy did not like that his eyes were on his brother. Eyes fixed solely on Dean, Bobby took a deep breath and threw caution to the wind. 

“Dean?”

Apparently Dean didn’t like that either because he hissed at Bobby again. His face contorted in warning and it struck Bobby that the boy looked more animal then human, fangs protruding from his jaws, clawed hands tensed and curled sharply. 

His finger twitched on the trigger in reflex and Dean snarled louder, the sound echoing in the darkness. The barrel of his shotgun still aimed at Dean started to twist and bend and curl in on its self in the face of Dean’s fury. With a shout of surprise Bobby dropped the gun and jumped away. 

The moment it hit the gravel it stopped its contorting and Dean stopped his snarling. 

And that, right there, that just pissed Bobby off. 

“Goddamnit, Dean!” He cursed in frustration no longer caring about spooking the creature perched ready to attack above him. “I’ve had that gun longer than you’ve been alive! Do you know how hard it is to find unregistered firearms in this state?”

Seemingly stunned from Bobby’s outburst, Dean shrank away from the edge of the tower and lost a little of his wildness, but not all of it. 

Pausing in his rant Bobby stared in surprise as the demon, the antichrist, just watched him now. He wasn’t snarling or hissing or even really glaring, he was just watching Bobby while he crouched as close as he could to his brother. 

And that’s when Bobby got it. Dean was protecting his brother. Sam was hurt and unconscious that much he could see from the ground. Dean was covering him almost like a mama bear would cover her cubs and for some reason that thought took all the fight out of the older hunter. 

Sighing resignedly, Bobby rubbed at his head through his cap and just looked up at the two boys _hiding_ in his scrap yard. 

“Dean, your brother needs help.” He told the boy, not that he really thought that Dean was actually understanding him at this point. Whatever had happened to those boys it hadn’t been good because Dean had somehow regressed entirely to his baser instincts and Sam looked like –well- three different kinds of hell. 

Shaking his head again, Bobby couldn’t believe he was actually thinking about inviting them back into his house. 

“Come on, boy.” He said with a nod of his head toward the house as he picked up his now useless gun tucking it under his arm. “Get down from there and bring Sam up to the house. We’ll see what can be done for him inside.” 

Dean didn’t move. 

“Now, boy!” Bobby barked, his sleep tired brain and general impatience with the world speaking before this brain could engage. 

But instead of being set upon and rent limb from limb by an animalistic Dean, the boy just jumped in surprise before he gently lifted his brother into his arms and jumped from the scrap heap to land on cat light feet before straightening up tall and powerful. 

Bobby felt his breath catch in his throat at the raw power that was wafting off the boy in waves before he shook himself and blinked away the awe that had suddenly taken up residence in his gut. 

These boys were really something to see. They were frightening, childish, deviant, amoral, loyal, powerful, righteous, and loving. A very dangerous and awe-inspiring combination. 

Dean had Sam cradled to his chest like a child with an arm around his brother’s shoulders and the other underneath his knees. It shouldn’t have really been possible for Dean to hold him much less carry him like that seeing as how Sam was a good four inches taller and probably thirty pounds heavier. 

But that didn’t seem to have even occurred to Dean. He was standing tall and large with his even larger brother held in his arms like he weighed less than a feather. 

It took Bobby a moment to steady his breathing. “Alright, then.” He whispered, then cleared his throat subconsciously when Dean pinned him with glowing green eyes. “Let’s get you boys inside.”

Casting furtive glances around the yard as he led the way back to the house, Bobby really hoped that whatever had gotten the boys into this kind of shape hadn’t followed them home. He flicked a quick look at Dean where he seemed to glide behind him on the power streaming from his pores and highly doubted that anything that would hurt Sam would have lived for very long afterward. 

Once again he couldn’t decide whether to be grateful for the brother’s mercy in regards to him or chagrined. So far it seemed to be a bit of a mixed blessing. 

They stepped across the threshold and into Bobby’s dark house in silence. They got all the way into Bobby’s study before he registered the strange grating sound that seemed to follow him as doggedly as Dean. 

Freezing in his steps he ignored the annoyed growl from Dean and listened closer. It was coming from above. Slowly he lifted his eyes and promptly cursed a blue streak. 

He couldn’t choose between being slightly scared, grudgingly impressed, or just plain pissed as he watched Dean’s power unconsciously twist, contort, and scrape at the Devil’s Traps on his ceiling. They weren’t being erased, which Bobby supposed he should be grateful for, but they were now completely useless and he didn’t have a hope of fixing them. Seeing as how he’d carved them into the sheetrock and Dean had just twisted them beyond recognition. 

Lowering his gaze back down, he saw Dean staring at him with a defiant glint his green eyes. He scowled back at him. “Boy, you better know how to fix those or you’re in for a world of hurt.” 

Dean didn’t say anything to that. Not that Bobby really expected him to. He just broke eye contact and glanced down at his brother’s unconscious form with a mournful expression on his face. 

Some of his ire melting away, Bobby figured he should be grateful none of those Traps had the power locking runes in them or Dean would have brought the entire house down. He didn’t seem to be in a patient state of mind to wait for Bobby to scratch them out. 

“Yeah, I know, kid.” Bobby sighed as he rubbed his forehead tiredly and gesture to the couch in the study. “Set him down and I’ll see what’s what.” 

Bobby went around turning on lights and gather supplies while keeping half an eye on Dean as he placed his brother down on the lumpy old sofa like he was made of glass. 

It would never cease to disturb him, the Winchester’s relationship, but at the same time he found himself envious of it as well. That they could be together with their loved one while he’d been forced to kill his sending her beyond his reach until he finally bit the bullet himself. 

“Bobby.” The low rumbling word knocked him out of his dark thoughts and he turned in surprise to find Dean staring at him. He sounded completely wrecked, voice rolling out like broken glass and gravel.

“Dean.” He nodded back at him and made his way over to perch on the coffee table with his medical supplies. “Let me see to your brother.” He said quietly so as not to spook the young man into retreating back into his animal instincts. 

Dean looked like he was fighting to stay human enough to speak. His countenance kept wavering between frighteningly savage and scared young man. Finally he managed to cough out, “Help him. Please.” 

“I will, boy.” Bobby assured him seriously. He would help Sam as much as he could. He owed the boy for keeping his brother from killing him and there was just something about the Winchester boys that you just couldn’t help, but want to help them. 

Turning the entirety of his attention back to Sam, Bobby carefully pulled the boy’s torn bloodied shirt away from his chest. It took him just a split second to understand why Dean was struggling with his humanity. 

Sam had been tortured. 

His entire upper body was a picture of the kind of masterpiece that wouldn’t be out of place in an ancient interrogation room. The veins in his arms were standing up in dark relief, nearly black against his too pale skin, the nails of his left hand had been systematically pulled out of their beds, and his chest had a series of deliberately placed cuts meant for the maximum amount of pain and the minimum chance of bleeding out. Not to mention burns circling around his torso like he’d been wrapped in white hot chains.

Whoever had done this knew their stuff. And Bobby knew that whoever had done this was a hunter. 

There wasn’t anything that could keep these boys if they didn’t want to be kept except for that ring of runes Bobby had added to the Devil’s Tarp the first time they’d met. Time and research and archaic rituals went into incapacitating the boys, or at least Sam. It shouldn’t have been possible to get that close to Sam especially with Dean standing guard over his brother like a pit-bull. 

No, whoever had done this had had both brothers at their mercy. Whoever had done this had made Dean watch. 

A small whimper pulled his attention away from Sam’s wounds for a second. Dean was staring with wide agonized eyes at his brother’s body from where he was kneeling beside the couch, an inhuman sound of pain echoing out of his chest. 

“Won’t heal.” He choked out through his battle for coherency. “Sammy won’t heal. Can’t,” he coughed then gritted his teeth in determination and gripped his brother’s legs in a white-knuckle hand. “Can’t keep him like this much longer.” 

Understanding struck along with horror and shock. Dean was using his power to keep Sam alive. The pure power flowing off him like waves of heat was because Sam wasn’t healing. Why wasn’t the boy healing? 

Bobby didn’t spend anytime marveling at the sheer strength of Dean or the strength of his connection to his brother, before he was searching every inch of Sam’s body for any sort of power dampener, or seal locking away his magic. 

“Why isn’t he healing, Dean?” Bobby asked in a rush when he couldn’t find anything. 

“Bullet.” Dean ground out in a growl that sent the hairs on Bobby’s neck shivering. “Bullet in his chest.” 

And there it was. A nearly invisible pucker right above Sam’s heart. It looked as though the skin had started to heal over it, but stopped before the hole could completely disappear. 

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Bobby breathed even as he reached for his forceps and his scalpel. He was going to have to cut into the wound to get the damned thing out. “I thought you boys couldn’t be hurt by guns.” He stated as he pressed the tip of the scalpel to Sam’s skin. 

He ignored Dean’s warning growl and just put his concentration on the incision. “I hope it didn’t hit his heart.” 

“Didn’t. Can’t.” Dean answered both of his unasked questions, voice still grating out of his throat like rocks. “Crazy old gun.”

As Bobby gripped the bullet with the forceps and pulled it out of Sam’s chest in a slow careful motion he had just enough time get a good look at before he knew exactly what kind of a crazy old gun could have shot this bullet. 

“Well, I’ll be damned.” That was about as much as he could think or say before Sam’s entire body arched off the couch and Dean’s power suddenly flooded the room with enough force and potency to suffocate. 

Before their eyes the dark swollen veins in Sam’s arms started to pump whatever poison was in them to the boy’s heart, the slices, incisions and burns on his chest started to seal themselves and the nails of Sam’s left hand grew from their bloodied, torn beds faster than naturally possible. The bullet hole in the boy’s chest started pumping hot blood in rapid rhythmic bursts as if trying to purge the wound of whatever magic had been carried by the bullet before it started to close up and heal, leaving only a small puckered, pink scar behind. 

Sam’s body was still arching and jerking and Bobby couldn’t breathe from the power filling the room like water. Suddenly Dean lurched forward to curl taught and stiff over Sam’s chest as he arched again. His toes and the top of his head were the only things touching the couch when his illuminated hazel eyes snapped open and his mouth fell wide and gaping in a scream. 

But it wasn’t just a tortured sound that came pouring out of Sam’s mouth. The poison had pumped all the way through Sam’s heart and was now flowing up through the veins in his neck and face. Bobby wouldn’t have been surprised if a thick viscous fluid burst from Sam along with his unholy scream, but that’s not what it was. 

It was steam; steam so hot that it made sweat break out on all over Bobby’s body as it billowed up and out of the boy like an inverted photograph of a demon smoking out. 

Then the steam was gone, the wounds were healed and Sam’s body gave one last bone shaking jerk before a ripple of power burst from him like an atomic explosion. It moved outward rattling everything in its wake. Bobby could hear the scrap heaps in the yard shudder as it swept past. 

Then everything was quiet. 

Sam was breathing in gasping sucking breaths and Dean was pressed against his chest like he was afraid to let go, his eyes wide and completely transfixed on his little brother’s open and slightly uncomprehending eyes. 

Bobby just sat on the coffee table in shock. The bullet that had started all this clutched at the end of his forceps in a grip so tight Bobby was afraid he’d never be able to pry his fingers open again. 

“Dean?” Sam’s voice sounded like he hadn’t taken a drink in a week. “Dean?” 

“Sammy.” Dean breathed and surged upward to cradle Sam’s face in his hands gently. “Oh god, Sammy. Are you alright?” 

“Yeah.” Sam reached up with shaking hands and grasped his brother’s wrists like they were the only things keeping him stable. “Dean, what-? What- I don’t-”

“Shh.” Dean hushed him gently as he thumbed away tears that Sam didn’t even realize he’d been crying. “It’s alright, baby. I got you.” He leaned forward and kissed Sam’s chapped lips like they were the most delicate of flower petals. “Rest, Sam. I got you.” 

Sam’s hands spasmed around Dean’s wrists and a sob was suddenly ripped from him. “Don’t leave. Please, Dean, don’t go.” He begged as he let go of Dean’s hands to clutch with desperate shaking fingers at Dean’s chest and arms. 

“I won’t. I’m not.” Dean assured him as he carefully slipped his hands from Sam’s face to his back lifting him up enough so Dean could slip behind him. “It’s alright, Sammy.” He murmured as he situated himself in the corner of the couch with his legs on either side of Sam and his arms wrapped tight and secure around his brother. 

“I’m right here. Just rest now.” He whispered in Sam’s ear as he cradled his brother’s head and upper body against his chest and combed his fingers soothingly through his blood matted, sweaty hair. “Sleep, little brother. I’m watching over you.” 

Bobby felt the light brush of magic in the air as Dean feathered a light kiss to the top of Sam’s head. Then Sam’s breathing evened out, his face pressed to Dean’s chest and Bobby realized that the boy was dead asleep curled up to his older brother like he was a small child. 

Of course Bobby had yet to move from his place on the coffee table and now that the room was suddenly deathly silent he felt like the worst kind of voyeur. It was as if such tenderness between the brothers should have been sacred, been secret. 

“What the fuck is that?” Dean suddenly asked, voice pitched low to keep from disturbing Sam from his magic induced rest. 

Nearly jumping out of his skin, Bobby looked from Dean to the bullet the other man was now glaring at. 

It struck him that Dean was now exactly as he had always been. Any trace of animal, or wildness was now buried deep so that only the barest hint of it showed. Bobby wasn’t eager to see it resurface and sensed that the beast Dean had become to protect his brother, to expend as much power as possible to help keep him alive was still much too close to the surface. 

“It’s a bullet.” Bobby answered dumbly, his voice just as quiet as Dean’s. 

“No shit.” Dean growled, then quieted again when Sam made a sleepy noise and turned his face deeper into Dean’s chest. “Why did it block Sam’s healing power? Why did it take nearly every ounce of the power inside of me to keep it from ravaging my brother from the inside out?” He asked angrily. “No bullet shot from any kind of gun should have been able to do that to us.” 

“You’re right.” Bobby answered as he picked up a glass of vodka he’d been using to disinfect his tools and dropped the bullet in it. “No normal bullet from a normal gun would do that. But this,” he held the tumbler full of alcohol and bullet up to the light illuminating the markings all around the now mushroom shaped slug. “This is not a normal bullet.” 

Dean stared at the older man silently. His suddenly glowing green eyes asked his questions for him. 

“I had thought it was a myth.” Bobby admitted as a preface. “A hunter’s legend.” He clarified, swirling the liquid in the glass around gently, blood and tissue falling away the bullet in flecks. 

Sighing, suddenly so very tired, Bobby dropped his hand with the glass to dangle between his knees lazily as he leaned forward. Elbows propped on his knees, Bobby’s voice rumbled ominously as he began to talk. 

“They say that back in 1835, when Halley's Comet was overhead, on the same night those men died at the Alamo, Samuel Colt made a gun. A special gun.” Bobby said with a tilt of his head. “He made it for a hunter. A man like me, only on horseback.” He rubbed at his beard and continued. 

“Story goes, he made thirteen bullets. This hunter used the gun a half dozen times before he disappeared, the gun along with him.” Bobby shrugged and leaned back gesturing with the glass pointedly. “They say this gun can kill anything.”

Dean growled then and tightened his arms around Sam enough to make the younger man whimper before he loosened his hold and stroked his hair soothingly again. “Well, it damn near killed Sam.” He said. “If I hadn’t been halfway to burning through those fucking enchanted chains they wrapped us in I don’t think I would have been able to stop it from hitting his heart in time.” 

Bobby nodded at that. Not really sure what else to say. “Last rumor I heard about the gun was that an old retired hunter named Daniel Elkins had it.” He offered. “Of course he never owned up to it, but then he died and it became a moot point when it never turned up in his things.” 

“Well, a pair of hunters with souls as black and hypocritical as Hitler’s have the damned thing and they nearly killed my brother with it.” Dean said, voice dripping with disdain, and a hint of self deprecating shame. 

It’s not surprising that Dean would feel that way. For creatures as powerful and headstrong as the Winchesters, to be captured, tortured and almost killed by an otherwise unremarkable human, must be galling. 

“Those fuckers tortured him first.” Dean snarled, burying his nose in Sam’s hair as he curled himself almost double around his brother as if to shield him from the memory with his own body. “They wanted to hurt him before they killed him and I couldn’t do a damned thing about it.” 

Bobby knew just how much helplessness stuck in a man’s craw, but he knew they couldn’t avoid it for very long. There were possibly two dead hunters out there that Bobby might have to deny any knowledge of and they were sure to have friends. The boys got themselves in a heap of trouble and Bobby had to know just how much of it he could help them with. 

“Dean, I think it’s time you tell me what exactly happened to you and your brother?” He said gravely, his eyes dark and steady. 

Dean lifted his eyes from staring at his brother’s peacefully sleeping face and locked his gaze with Bobby’s. His eyes were fathomless and swirling with so much power and unnamable things that Bobby desperately wanted to look away, but found that his eyes were frozen wide open and immobile. 

All he could see was green. All he could breathe, hear, and taste was the unending pools of Dean’s bright, glowing green eyes. He thought he was going to actually drown in Dean’s gaze until the boy’s voice echoed through his head like a lifeline that he clutched at with desperate clawing fingers. 

_“Why don’t you see for yourself?”_

*

Dean could feel the burning. The chains wrapped so tight he could barely breathe were slowly burning into his skin like acid. His head was groggy and felt like it was filled with cotton, but he could still take in his surroundings enough to know that he and Sammy were in deep shit. 

Devil’s Traps, two of them, kept him and Sammy separated and stationary. The ring of runes around the outside damped their magic and the spells etched in the same language on the chains keeping a choke hold on Dean were slowly sucking the power out of him. Sam wasn’t much better. 

They were chained to chairs in the center of their small Traps and they were all but helpless.

“Sammy.” He called, voice rough and dry. “Sam, wake up.”

“Ugh.” Sam groaned and lifted his head from his chest groggily. “Dean?” He had a steadily bleeding gash on the side of his head, and Dean wasn’t surprised it wasn’t healing. 

The runes on the chains were sealing both of their powers so far deep into them that Dean could barely hear himself think over the white noise they created. 

“You okay, Sammy?” He asked, voice growing stronger. 

“No.” Sam let out in a small whimper. “Dean, I-I can’t feel you! I can’t feel anything.” He said, words pitched high in his barely coherent panic. 

“I know.” Dean soothed, just barely holding it together himself. He’d never not felt his brother before. This, this felt almost as though Sam was dead. It was quickly getting to him. “I know, Sammy. I’m gonna get you outa here. Just hold on.” 

“I wouldn’t be so sure, Dean.” Came a sickeningly silky voice from the shadows. Jerking their heads around the boys saw a thin, black skinned man with black, glinting eyes step out of the darkness. “We’ve been looking for you two for a long time.” He told them. He was followed into the light by an even skinnier, dried up white man with eyes that dripped with religious hypocrisy. 

“Is that so?” Dean drawled sardonically. His skin felt like it was about to start corroding away from the chains around him. “And why is that?” 

“You and Sammy here are unnatural.” He said with a cruel little smirk on his lips. “You’ve got demon in you.”

Growling, suddenly very much unamused, Dean tried to jerk forward in his chains, but only succeeded in rattling them uselessly. “Only I get to call him Sammy.”

Smirk growing, the guy just strode forward and lifted a hand to stroke it down Sam’s face. “Abominations like you don’t have names.” He said. 

Sam jerked away from his touch and snarled in fury. His power lashed out before he could even register it, but instead of ripping the skin from the bastard’s bones, the chains turned the power back on him and his skin began to sizzle and smoke. 

“Ahh!” He yelled in shock and pain. 

“Sam!” Dean bellowed, his own power surging forward, but he tamped it down before it could be let loose. He couldn’t afford to waste his energy on anger and pain. If he was going to get them out of here he was going to have to siphon his magic to burn away at the runes. 

But that strategy didn’t do anything for his very real rage at his captors for touching his Sammy. “Don’t you touch him you son of a bitch!” 

“Kubrick.” The black man commanded and the other one suddenly lashed out with a flask of holy water spraying Dean in stinging droplets. 

“Mother fucker!” He cursed, shaking his head to rid his face of the burning liquid. 

“It’s working.” The scrawny one exclaimed with a sick kind of glee that Dean wanted to skin right off of his face. “Gordon, the holy water is working.” 

The other guy, Gordon, grinned. “Good.” He turned around and wheeled in a tray of things that Dean recognized from his childhood lessons with Alistair. Dread and fury broiled in his gut. 

“You touch one hair on my brother’s head and I will fillet the skin from your bones one layer at a time.” He warned in a deadly tone that would have had any demon in Hell quaking in fear. 

It would seem that these two hunters, because that’s exactly what they were, weren’t smart enough to see a bigger predator when they had him chained and caged like a tiger in a wicker basket. 

“We know that it’s you that’s been torturing people in their homes.” Gordon informed them as he started filling a larger syringe with holy water. “And we know that your little brother here is supposed to lead an army of the damned to march across the earth spreading decease and death in his wake.” 

Dean hissed and snarled like an animal as Gordon turned around with the syringe held aloft like he was a deranged doctor. “It’s up to us to stop him.” 

“It’s God’s will.” Kubrick added with a self righteous look that made Dean grit his teeth. “He led us on this path of heavenly justice.”

“I got news for you, asshole.” Dean growled, his skin almost glowing with his anger. “God doesn’t care about you or your path. In fact,” he grinned suddenly, wickedly, “I’m pretty sure neither of you even register on His radar. Your souls being worthless pits of ignorance and all.” 

Faces suddenly not so satisfied and smug, Gordon lunged at Sam, and stabbed the syringe deep into his arm pressing the plunger with a ruthless shove. 

With barely enough time to gasp in shock, Sam’s very blood vessels were suddenly burning and steaming in his body. The holy water made them swell and darken like black rivers curving and snaking up his arm and over his shoulder in painful currents. 

He couldn’t help the agonized scream from erupting out of him; the sound of Dean’s furiously shouting voice barely penetrated his mind. 

“Now, Sam.” Gordon said in a reasonable tone even as Sam kept screaming and Dean kept shouting bloody murder. “Tell us your plans and we’ll kill you quickly.” 

There was nothing to tell and so the torture went on. Dean lost a little bit of himself with every fingernail they ripped from Sam’s fingers, every slice they made to his exposed chest, every syringe of holy water they injected into his veins like poison. 

It went on and on, Gordon and Kubrick torturing his little brother and Dean’s power slowly building to insurmountable heights as the runes on his chains slowly began to burn red hot and melt away. With every rune, every pain filled scream, Dean’s power buried a little bit more of his humanity. 

“I think we have everything we can get out of him, Gordon.” Kubrick said finally after Sam was reduced to incoherency. “Let’s end it.” 

“You’re right.” Gordon agreed, though his voice dripped with reluctance. “Hand me the gun.” 

Dean almost wanted to laugh if he wasn’t so far inside himself that he could count his own blood cells. No gun can kill them. It’s been tried and it has failed. He was suddenly eternally thankful for these hunters’ stupidity. 

That is, until Kubrick brought the gun out and handed it to Gordon with a look of reverence on his face. 

Dean took one look at it, at the magic weaved in and around it like the damn thing had been forged in it and knew. He knew that it was time for him to get his brother out of there. His magic reacted and the runes began melting away like so much ice on a hot day. 

Gordon held the gun level and true, aimed at a barely conscious Sam’s heart and said, “Good bye, Samuel Winchester.” Then he pulled the trigger. 

Dean felt the tidal wave of power pour out of him and clash with the magic flaring out of the gun as the bullet raced unwaveringly toward his brother. He couldn’t stop it from piercing his beloved brother’s flesh, but he could stop it from piercing his heart. 

There was a stunned moment of silence where Sam’s body jerked with impacted then slumped lifeless in his chair before Dean surged out of his own bindings with an inhuman roar of rage and exploded. 

The chains shattered like glass, the Devil’s Traps crumbled and quaked like colliding tectonic plates and then Dean snapped Kubrick’s neck like it was a twig. 

Another shot rang out, just barely missing Dean by a breath. He felt the magic in it and he lunged again. Gordon went flying and the gun clattered to the floor. Dean didn’t spare him another thought as he scooped his brother’s limp body up out of the scattered bits of chain and Trap. He felt the drain on his power as he struggled to keep the bullet from penetrated further, felt the animalistic instinct call out for him to go somewhere safe and familiar. 

He pressed Sam protectively to his body and then he was gone.

*

Suddenly released from Dean’s hold, Bobby found himself collapsed to his knees on the floor in front of the sofa with his hands gripping his thighs bruisingly and his entire body shaking. 

He hadn’t just seen it all through Dean’s eyes. He’d actually been Dean. Felt him as he slowly lost control in his captivity, as he stopped his brother’s death, as he snapped Kubrick’s neck, as he let loose more power from inside him than should be possible even for an antichrist. 

Never in his life had he wanted to slap someone upside the head more than he did right then. 

“Boy,” he said, voice shaking, “if you ever do that to me again, I will kick your ass all the way to Hell and back.” 

“You understand, now.” Dean said, completely ignore Bobby’s threat. “You understand exactly what happened to my brother; what I did.” 

Bobby noted his specific word choice, but didn’t comment. “Yeah, Dean. I understand. There any truth to what Gordon Walker was accusing you of?” He asked, not even bothering to brave getting off the floor. He figured the floor was just as good as any place to sit and he didn’t really think he’d be able to move yet much less stand. 

“No.” Dean stated. “We are the Princes of Hell, yes. Destined to sit the throne of Perdition, but Sam is not raising an army of the damned.” He spit out like a curse. “Sam wouldn’t know what to do with an army of puppies, much less the damned.”

Bobby nodded. He believed him. Had no reason not to. From what he had seen, what he knew of the Winchesters, they were not particularly ambitious. They were perfectly happy to drive along the American highway in their magic Impala till the End of Days sending wicked souls to Hell when the mood struck them. 

And yet the thought of those boys in any kind of position of authority, much less Kings of Hell, made a shiver of fear race up his spine. 

“You didn’t kill, Gordon.” Bobby pointed out, trying to keep his mind on the here and now. On the problems they could fix, needed to fix. 

“No.” Dean agreed. “I was more worried about Sam.” He stroked light fingers over Sam’s cheek, the very motion sang of awe and thankfulness. 

It was hard not to watch, so Bobby didn’t even try. “He’ll be looking for you.” He said, eyes still following the reverent path of Dean’s fingers as they traced Sam’s brow, nose and lips. “Gordon Walker is a damned good hunter. He’s set his sights on your brother, he ain’t just gonna let him go.” 

Dean growled again. “Let him come then. I’ll kill him before he gets within a hundred feet of Sam.” 

“Dean, I can protect myself.” Sam said suddenly, even though his eyes were still closed and Bobby hadn’t noticed any change in his breathing.

“Like hell.” Dean snapped at him, but kept his arms around his brother as Sam straightened up from his sprawl across his chest to look him in the eyes. “That fucker was torturing you, Sammy. He deserves to know just what real torture feels like.” 

“I know.” Sam murmured as he brought up his healed left hand to caress Dean’s anger tense cheek. “But I would rather let him go than have you killed by a special hunter’s gun.” 

Bobby blinked in surprise at that even as Dean frowned petulantly. “You were listening in on my thoughts.” He accused.

“Mm.” Sam agreed before he dipped his head and pulled Dean’s lips into a long lingering kiss. “And you sent me to sleep like I was still a child.”

“You needed to rest, Sammy.” Dean protested. “You almost died and I-I couldn’t do anything. You needed time to heal.” 

“I know.” Whispered Sam and Bobby finally found it in himself to turn away from the painfully private scene in front of him. “But you got me out. You brought me here and told Bobby how to help me. Dean, you saved me.” 

“You shouldn’t have needed saving.” His brother growled and Sam just rolled his eyes. 

“Enough.” Sam scolded turning back to Bobby, but not leaving his place sitting between Dean’s legs. “Bobby, what do we need to do?” 

Jerking back around, Bobby cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Kubrick was a bit of a loner, but he had friends. Now Gordon, he’s a good hunter like Hannibal Lector is a good psychiatrist. The man is relentless and more than a little disturbed.” 

He rubbed at his beard in thought reaching the same unpleasant conclusion as he had after being sucked into Dean’s memories. “Gordon will be coming after you sooner rather than later. He’ll have learned damned near everything about you and I wouldn’t be surprised if he knows my connection with you.” 

A concerned frown pulled at Sam’s forehead. “Bobby, will this cause you problems?” 

He just shrugged. “No more than usual. Don’t worry about it. Let’s concentrate on keeping him away from you two first.” 

Dean was studying him with an unreadable look that sent the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. 

He opened his mouth and spoke words of power that sounded more familiar than Bobby would have liked. 

“Robert Singer, in gratitude for your friendship and vassalage you have our protection from all foes of Hell’s and Heaven’s making.” He said, voice echoing through the house as if it were a cavern. 

Bobby felt it like a blanket falling over his shoulders and knew the truth in Dean’s words as if it was set in his bones. He could only murmur, “Thank you,” as he fought off the urge to shiver and the slight annoyance at being called anyone’s vassal. 

He didn’t know if having the Winchesters’ protection once again was comforting or troubling and he didn’t really have time to think on it. Gordon Walker was probably knee deep in his plans to get at Sam and Dean again and they had to act quickly. 

“Gordon will be hunting you.” He said again. “But I have a feeling that if you don’t want to be found he won’t be able to find you.” 

“No,” Sam agreed with a bit of a smile. “He wouldn’t be able to.” 

“But we’re not running.” Dean declared angrily and his brother didn’t correct him. It seemed they were of the same mind, and Bobby couldn’t help but think they were holding a whole other conversation with each other that he wasn’t privy to. 

“That fucker wants us so bad he can come and get us. We’ll be waiting.” 

Sam sighed and placed a soothing hand on his brother’s thigh. “If your right about him, Bobby, he’ll come here first. He’ll have no scruples in trying to go through you to get to us. So we’ll stay here.” 

“Yeah,” Dean grinned suddenly. “We’ll have ourselves a good old fashioned showdown.” 

Groaning, Sam just rubbed at his forehead in long suffering and Bobby couldn’t help but pray that his house and his yard survived this _good old fashioned showdown_ more or less intact. 

He highly doubted the few things that spent any significant amount time around the Winchesters came out on the other side without more wear and tear than they went in with. If he was lucky he’d live long enough to die in his sleep and not caught in the crosshairs of Heaven and Hell and everything else that nips along at the Winchester’s heels.

*

The sun was just starting to peak over the trees when the call came in. The wall of phones started to ring one after another, one ring each until Bobby’s salvage yard line finally chimed three full tones. 

Dean and Sam looked at each other with mildly amused quirks to their lips, but Bobby couldn’t find anything funny about it. That damned Gordon was trying to scare him. It was mildly insulting. 

When his salvage line started ringing again he picked up and answered like nothing strange had happened at all. Like he didn’t have two Hell spawn lounging in his study drinking beer and cuddling like puppies. 

“Singer Salvage.”

“Bobby Singer.” Yep, it was Gordon alright. “Where are the antichrists?”

Turning back to look at the boys sitting with suddenly deadly serious expressions on their faces, Bobby answered as cool as a cucumber. “Boy, what are you talking about? There ain’t no such thing as an antichrist. They’re just a myth like angels and bigfoot.” 

Dean gave a snort at that and murmured to Sam, “I don’t think Cas would agree with that.” 

“Shut up, Dean.” Sam scolded back, but Bobby could tell he was amused and agreed with his brother’s assertion about Cas, whoever that was. 

“Bobby, you are lying to me.” Gordon stated in that mellow tone of his that would be noted as creepy by just about everyone. “I know that you’ve made a deal with the demons. I know that you’ve sold your soul to them. I want to know where they are and I’ll let you live.” 

Anger boiled up inside of him then and he was too shakes away from hanging up the phone. A growl from behind him told him that he wasn’t the only one severely pissed off by this fool’s audacity. 

“We don’t bargain souls.” Dean stated, with deadly menace. “And we don’t threaten our enemy’s protected so cavalierly.” 

“Hush, Dean.” Sam scolded though his voice didn’t hold nearly as much lightness or amusement as Bobby usually observed coloring his expression when he told his brother off. “Gordon Walker will die. And we’ll protect Bobby till this ends.”

Dean’s face smoothed over and a serene expression replaced his anger. He stroked a hand from Sam’s hip where it had been resting down his thigh to curl possessively along the inseam of his jeans. Sam gave a little satisfied sigh before turning around in Dean’s arms and capturing his lips in a light kiss. 

Bobby felt the magic of the kiss ripple through the air like they’d just struck a pact and had to force himself to turn back to the sickeningly silky voice in his ear. The longer he spent with the Winchesters the more caught up in their spell he felt himself becoming. 

“Bobby Singer, do not protect those Hell abominations at the cost of your own life.” Gordon instructed him condescendingly. 

“Gordon,” Bobby started, ready to finally end this conversation. “Do not insult me again. My soul is my own and no hunter worth his salt would ever make a deal with a demon!” He nearly shouted into the phone. His study had fallen into silence and he could hear the static over the line like it was blaring. “Get your head out of your ass and quit this fool’s errand before you get yourself and anyone else you’ve dragged along with you killed.

“And if you do survive this,” which he knew as not going to happen, and judging by Dean’s snort, the boy was going to see to it personally. “I want you to lose my number.” 

He nearly broke the phone from the wall he slammed the receiver down so hard. 

There was stillness for a moment before Dean cleared his throat. “So he’s coming here then.” 

Bobby turned back toward them and rubbed at his hair resignedly. “Yep.” 

*

Bobby pulled an arsenal together from all the nooks and crannies in his house while he watched in no small parts bemusement and amusement as Dean and Sam carted in their own arsenal from the Impala after it had appeared in Bobby’s back drive sometime during breakfast.

Sam caught him eyeing the Tommy gun he was doing a quick check up and maintenance on before loading it with a thirty round stick clip of .45s. He smirked and held the gun up for Bobby’s inspection. 

“Dean has a thing for guns.” Sam said before setting it aside to start loading up a couple of the sawed offs Dean had pulled out of a seemingly bottomless duffle bag of fire power. 

“Right.” Bobby nodded sagely as he went back to his own gearing up for war. “Do you really think we’re gonna need all this?” He asked gesturing to the guns laid out on his kitchen table.

Sam glanced up at them and paused for a moment before finally shaking his head. “No, but Dean will use any excuse to pull out his toys. Besides,” he shrugged and shifted a bit uncomfortably. “We don’t know what exactly Gordon will bring with him. He could have figured out how to enchant any kind of weapon like that Colt, he could have figured out how throw a blanket dampener around us so Dean’s and my power would be practically useless.” 

“You never know, and so you should always be prepared.” Dean finished for his brother as he stepped back into the kitchen carrying a leather roll of shining metal tools that Bobby very much did not want to contemplate the use of. 

“Dean, we’re not letting him get close enough to torture.” Sam reminded his brother thoroughly dashing Bobby’s hopes of being blissfully ignorant. 

“I know.” Dean said as he rolled out the leather case and started to inspect his instruments. “I’m just making sure they’re all sharp incase he’s gets hit with a stupid stick and tries to just walk up and pop us in the head.” 

Sighing, Sam picked up a gleaming pearl handled Taurus, checked the clip and loaded a bullet in the chamber before he slipped it into the small of his back. “Dean, we’re never that lucky.” 

His brother just rolled up his tools again and grinned. “I can always hope, can’t I?” 

It was disturbing how blasé they were being and Bobby wasn’t so sure he could ever be so nonchalant when he was preparing for a siege. Especially when he was possibly going to have to tear down fellow hunters. 

Actually the whole thing was leaving a foul taste in his mouth. He asked himself again just how crazy he had to be to invite such creatures as the Winchesters into his home. 

Pretty darned crazy, he concluded with a sigh. 

Then suddenly all hell broke loose. 

A force like a hand shoved Bobby out of his chair and pressed him flat to the floor on his belly a breath before his house was torn apart by a volley of bullets from the front gates of the yard. 

He felt himself struggle to get up, to turn over and reach for a weapon, but he was held immobile by that hand of power as the bullets whizzed and zinging and ripped holes in his house. It seemed to take forever, but finally he was able to lift his head enough to see Dean and Sam standing in the middle of the kitchen, their faces blank with violence, pearl handled guns clasped easily in their hands, and bullets flowing around them like water. 

And just as suddenly as it started, it all stopped. The sound of his house groaning in pain made Bobby want to skin all those damned fool with his bare hands and he would have if the hand hadn’t still been holding him to the floor. 

Dean lifted a hand and pressed it gently to the wall next to him just above a jagged hole were a bullet ripped through the painted paneling. “It’s alright.” He murmured quietly, his eyes never leaving the sight of their assailants through the broken, shattered kitchen windows. “We’ll fix you up good as new once these fuckers have been dealt with.” 

It took Bobby a moment to understand that Dean was actually talking to the house. 

“Bobby,” Sam called as he knelt down beside him and helped him to his feet now that hand had disappeared. “We’ll only kill the ones that stand in our way. Get to the second floor; she’ll protect you from there.” 

Bobby didn’t have time to ask who _she_ was or why he was being relegated away from the battle before he was suddenly standing in his empty lounge on the second floor, his stained glass windows immaculate and untouched by the hail of bullets that ripped apart the first floor. 

“Well, I’ll be damned.” 

Out in the yard Gordon Walker stepped out of the ranks of the dozen hunters he scrounged up to take down the Hell spawn and smirked. 

“Dean and Sam Winchester, I give you the chance to surrender peacefully and I’ll make your deaths quick.” But not necessarily painless. 

“Eat shit and die!” Dean shouted out through the ruined windows of the kitchen. From what he could see only Gordon had bothered to protect himself from their powers. He had runes written out all over his chest and arms and he carried the Colt. 

The fool, Dean grinned and cocked his gun. Sam stood grim and ready beside him. “The others don’t need to die, Sammy.” He said, receiving a nod of agreement. “He didn’t even bother telling them how to protect themselves.” 

“I got it, Dean.” He said, voice low even as he brushed a caress along his brother’s lower back. 

Lifting a cupped hand to his mouth, Sam blew a gentle breath into his palm and murmured, “Sleep, you misguided fools. Our quarrel is not with you.” 

Then he tipped his hand and let the magic that had pooled there flow over and out to fall to the floor and stream out of the house toward the line of hunters standing rigid and tense and ready to charge. 

One by one they collapsed in on themselves and crumbled to the dusty ground in deeply breathing heaps of ignorance and paranoia. 

Gordon jerked around in alarm and watched as his companions fell, his face growing more and more furious by the second. Finally he shouted an unintelligible sound of rage and began to storm forward. 

“Show yourselves you animals!” He bellowed as he pulled out an H&K Mk.23 handgun from seemingly nowhere and started firing at the house wildly. 

A bullet burned Dean’s cheek as it passed by and his patience was gone. 

Suddenly frozen, the hairs standing up on the back of his neck, Gordon stopped shooting and listened to the heavy silence for any clue as to what had sent every instinct in his body screaming. 

“Now, that is not very nice.” Dean drawled as he appeared behind Gordon, his magic flowing around him thick like humidity. “Didn’t your mama ever teach you if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all?” 

Stiff with shock, Gordon took a split second to comprehend what just happened as he snapped around gun raised and aimed. But Dean was already gone. 

“Too slow.” He heard whispered in his left ear before the voice is gone again. Gordon jerked left, too late, then paused stunned as the runes he’d painstakingly drawn all over his body began to glow red and burn. 

“Ahh!” He gasped in shock and started to rub at his arms frantically as if to erase the semi permanent protection wards. 

“Didn’t think about that, did you?” Dean’s voice echoed all around the hunter as if he were standing in a canyon. “Those runes will keep our magic out, sure, but to keep such a powerful enchantment against bare skin?” He tisked as he materialized not ten feet in front of Gordon, a wicked grin on his face. “You must really not appreciate that chocolaty smooth complexion of yours too much.” 

He didn’t even have time to curse before Dean’s magic lashed out, battering itself against the runes keeping Gordon from being cut down as easily as his hapless companions. 

The magic of the antichrist didn’t touch him, no, but the pain from the burning and searing runes covering his skin was enough to nearly send him to his knees. 

Then the barrage stopped and Gordon was left to shake and wretch as he got himself under control. Both of his guns were still clutched white knuckled in his hands, he counted that as a blessing. 

“See, that’s the thing about death.” Dean said as he watched his opponent recover from his truly effortless attack. “It’s messy, and unpleasant, and so very much fun to watch.” He grinned. 

Bile rose in Gordon’s throat at the demon’s words and he used every single ounce of his remaining strength and hunter’s speed to snap the fabled Colt up, take aim and pull the trigger, the bead buried right where the antichrist’s heart should be. If he even had one.

The sound of the shot echoed slow and dragging through the air and wiped all mirth and mischievousness from Dean’s face. The bullet raced toward him, its number etched into the lead and its runes flaring bright red like the fires of Hell. 

Dean raised his left hand palm out and stopped the bullet a foot from its destination. It tried to force its way through the wall of his magic, spinning red hot against the calloused skin of his palm leaving a perfectly round burn from its efforts. Dean closed his hand around it and smothered its magic with the sheer overwhelming force of his own. 

Gordon watched it all in slow motion with horror and utter incomprehension plastered like a mask over his features. 

Clinching his fist around the bullet, Dean dropped his hand and looked at Gordon with glowing green eyes. “And that is why I’m not going to let you live.” 

Another shot rang out, but this time it was Gordon that fell to the ground clutching his bloody, ruined kneecap in shaking hands. His eyes were locked on the creature he thought he could kill, the creature he thought he could hold at his mercy with a string of runes. 

And in that moment he knew he was going to die. 

Dean stepped closer to the hunter that had captured and tortured his brother. His beloved little brother and felt absolutely no remorse. “Your first mistake was thinking that you knew a single thing about me and my brother.” He said as he followed Gordon’s desperate clawing crawl to get away. 

“Your second was thinking that you could find and wield the means to kill us.” He said as he lifted his 1911 Colt and took aim on the other leg. 

With a pull of the trigger, Gordon wasn’t trying to escape any longer. He was lying in a steadily growing pool of his own blood, his guns discarded, useless on the ground as he watched, terrified and angry, while his killer stalked closer.

“Your third,” Dean said with a pause, his gun aimed right between Gordon’s wide dark eyes, “was daring to try it a second time.” 

Gordon coughed and choked on vomit as he tried to clutch at his useless legs in spasming hands. “H-how?” He wheezed out uncomprehendingly, eyes darting from the gun in Dean’s hand to his bloody knees. “The runes… the protection of the runes…”

Dean just gave him a smirk and an unconcerned shrug. “What, you didn’t think antichrists could use their trigger fingers, too?”

A hum of familiar magic made Dean sigh in pleasure as Sam appeared beside him.

“Sammy.” Dean murmured, his eyes fluttering as Sam leaned closer and placed an open kiss to the smirking corner of his mouth. “Do you want to do the honors or shall I?” 

Sam licked at the delicious curve of his brother’s full lips and smiled sweetly down at their horrified victim. “You do it, Dean.” He said and nuzzled his brother’s ear teasingly. “I want to burn him to ashes. You can put a bullet in his brain first.” 

A truly wicked smile pulled frighteningly at Dean’s face before he leveled his gun on Gordon’s forehead once more and winked at him. “Good bye, Gordon Walker. We’ll be sure to visit you next time we’re in Hell.” 

One bullet from a normal gun in the hand of a very not normal young man and Gordon Walker was thrust into his eternity. 

Sam watched the body give one last death twitch before he raised one hand and snapped his fingers sharply. The body of his torturer went up in flames so hot that when they burned down all that was left was a scorched patch of gravel. The wind carried the rest of Gordon Walker away to be scattered. 

*

Bobby didn’t know a lot about the Winchesters, but he knew enough. He knew that they were ruthless, cruel, loyal, protective, and young. 

He knew that they had protected him from his own community. That they had spared those fools that followed Gordon into battle blindly. That they had wiped the hunters’ minds of any and all memory of the Winchesters or Bobby’s involvement with them before sending them home with a flick to the forehead. 

He knew that the Winchester boys were scary powerful like nothing he had ever seen before, and he knew that he was just a little bit glad that they seemed to regard him as a friend of a sort. 

Besides, no matter how scary and ruthless they can be, they are still just a couple of young boys stumbling their way through life like the rest of them. 

“Alright, isn’t that better?” Dean was saying to a newly repaired wall, as his power mingled with Sam’s to put the massacred house to rights. 

Bobby watched from the kitchen while the entire house groaned and moaned and creaked back to better than it had been in years. That crack in the front hall was gone, that creaky floorboard by the sink was silent and his Devil’s Traps were etched in prefect relief in his ceiling once again, but with a single symbol out of place so that the brothers could move around unhindered. 

“There now, darling.” Dean smiled and patted the doorway to the study. “Good as new. I said I’d fix you up, didn’t I?” 

“Dean.” Sam sighed with a hint of amusement in his tone while he was busy packing up their arsenal into their bottomless duffels. “I don’t think the house appreciates your crooning quite as much as the Impala does.” 

“Bite your tongue.” Dean scolded with a chuckle as he pressed his cheek to Bobby’s twenty year old wallpaper. “Don’t listen to him, sugar. He’s just jealous because you’re taller than him.” 

Sam rolled his eyes, and Bobby had to wonder if Dean was just teasing his brother or if he really thought that the house was alive. He figured it was safer not to ask. 

“Thanks again, Bobby.” Sam said, pulling Bobby from his morbidly fascinated observations of Dean still conversing with his house. “We really appreciate you helping us out again.” 

Bobby rubbed at his neck and propped his fists on his hips. “Don’t worry about it, son. God help me, but you’re welcome to come ‘round anytime.” 

Sam laughed at that and clasped a hand on Bobby’s shoulder before stepping back to give Dean room. 

“Thanks Bobby.” He said as well, but there was something in his voice that kept Bobby from brushing off his words as easily as he had Sam’s. “If you hadn’t helped us out I would have lost Sam, and I wouldn’t have been able to survive that.” 

“Dean.” Sam murmured quietly, sounding pained. 

“No, Sammy. You feel the same way.” Dean glanced over at his brother briefly before turning back to Bobby. “You saved both our lives and for that, I thank you. You have my unending gratitude and may ask for one gift that is within my power to give.” 

It struck Bobby as the kind of scenario he’d read about in those old fairytales about fae gifts and bargains. Rumpelstiltskin requesting your first born for services rendered, the Faery Queen’s kiss rendering you incapable of lying and the like. But suddenly Bobby had flashes of his beautiful wife, Karen, humming tunelessly in the kitchen, smiling sweetly at him with a glass of lemonade in her hand, stroking warm graceful fingers through his hair at the end of a hard day. 

He suddenly ached with the need and the want to see his wife just one last time damn the potentially fatal consequences and from the look on Dean’s face the younger man could see it in his mind as plain as day. 

“That, I’m afraid, is not within my power to give.” Dean admitted with a sad smile playing at his lips. 

Clearing his throat roughly, Bobby shook off those bittersweet memories and blinked away the dampness in his eyes. Clamping a suddenly shaking hand on Dean’s shoulder he gave the boy a rough smile. 

“Don’t be a stranger, then.” He said. “You two are the closest thing I have to family now, so don’t disappear on me.”

And for some reason that made both Winchesters simultaneously pale before flushing and grabbing him up in a group hug that had him hoping his bones weren’t being crushed. 

Finally, the boys were out the door and in their beast of a gleaming black Impala with the Colt that can kill anything tucked safely in their trunk. They drove away with hands waving farewell out of the open windows. 

Bobby watched them till their taillights were gone before he turned back to his kitchen and went about the task of making himself some dinner. 

*

“You think we should tell Bobby that his house is now the corporal body of a protective spirit?” Sam asked after two hundred miles and two hours of silence. He was curled up against Dean’s side with his brother’s arm wrapped securely around his shoulders.

“Nah.” Dean shrugged and pressed a quick kiss to Sam’s hair while he changed lanes to pass a sluggish truck towing a horse trailer. “Besides, the spirit has always been there. We just gave her a bit of a power boost.” 

Sighing contentedly, Sam closed his eyes and let the heat of the sun coming in from the open windows lull him into a doze. “I guess your right. Besides, the Impala likes her. Let’s just let Bobby figure it out on his own.” 

Dean chuckled. “Oh yeah, that’s going to be frickin’ hilarious.” 

*

End.


End file.
